Certain utility vehicles are typically equipped with a plurality of extensible and retractible outrigger assemblies usable for maintenance of stability of the vehicle and prevention of tipping while performing a work function. Notably, such vehicles include truck cranes which should be sufficiently narrow to safely traverse the highway en route to a work site. For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 3,279,622 to Person issued October 12, 1966. The extensible outrigger assemblies provide an enlarged pedestal of stability for the working vehicle at the work site. Usually two outrigger assemblies are provided on each side of the vehicle having outrigger beams which extend substantially outward from the side of the vehicle.
A float assembly is located at the outer end of the outrigger beam. The float assembly has a vertically extendible and retractible plate-like foot for engagement with the ground, known in the art as a float or a float pad. Vertical extension and retraction of the float pad is generally accomplished by means of a hydraulic power unit.
Float pads desirably have a large surface area for stable engagement with soft ground and the like. The float pads are extendible outward from the outrigger beam where they are disposed in a horizontal, working orientation. With the outrigger beams retracted in a storage position, as for travel of the vehicle, it is impractical to carry them in the horizontal orientation. They must either be removed, which is burdensome, or, as is frequently the case, they are stored adjacent the vehicle side in a generally vertical orientation. To accomplish the latter, the float pad must be pivotally affixed relative to the outrigger beam for rotation between the horizontal and vertical orientations.
Extension of the outrigger beam to the working position with the float pad in the vertical position poses difficulty, as the lower edge of the float pad closest the ground encounters obstacles which can inhibit or damage the outrigger assembly. It has been proposed to spring mount the float pad relative to the rod of the hydraulic motor, such that the outrigger beam is extended with the float pad vertically disposed, and when the float pad encounters an obstacle, it yields to the obstacle against the bias of the spring, returning to the vertical position after clearing the obstacle. A cam mechanism on the float assembly coacts with an actuator on the beam end to rotate the float pad to the horizontal orientation as the rod is downwardly extended toward the ground. It would be desirable to provide an outrigger assembly having a float pad which remains in the horizontal orientation during extension and retraction of the outrigger beam and which coacts with an actuator mounted on the outrigger housing to be tilted to the vertical, storage orientation just as the outrigger is fully retracted.